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Sunday, June 29, 2014

I was asked by a few people to share a tutorial on how I made the California Insert on my Studio Calico Penny Arcade spread using the digital files of the Funnel Cake stamp addon. So I sat down and figured out how to a screen grab video tutorial for you all. I figured it would be much easier to explain if I showed it this way versus a step by step with photos.

Please forgive the newness of this for me, its always hard to capture what you want to say when a blinking red record button is staring you down so hopefully you can follow me and it makes sense.

This first video is showing how to work with the files using Photoshop Elements. I'll show you exactly how I created the piece I made for my insert in this video.

This second video is showing you how to work with the files just using your Silhouette Studio program. I'll show you how to trace and remove the states you might not want and how to create your own background layer for cutting.

If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to ask below in the comments or if you came over from Studio Calico you can leave any questions on the message board post too.

I did mention the two digital classes being offered over at Studio Calico in the first video. They are a great resource for expanding your knowledge of Digital Scrapbooking so if you would like more info on either of those you can find the Digital Basics class here or the Beyond Digital Basics class here.

Friday, June 27, 2014

What a big day, Studio Calico Penny Arcade Reveal Day and my daughter's last day of school! More on the last part another time but for right now I'm here to show my full spreads for this months amazing kits.

Reminder: All links shown below will be live for subscribers as of right now 9:00am PST. Non Subscribers will be able to click thru the links tonight at 9:00pm PST.

This weeks spread had so much to include that it was hard for me to decide what to use and make room for and what to exclude. I decided to make an insert for an outing we had with friends so I could include more on the spread which you will see below. I loved that I'm Not Going to Freak Out card and had to use it for the day that Simone got her ears pierced, and the digital sentiment from the Churro stamp addon was perfect.

We went to the drive in with some friends, something I hadn't done it too many years to put down in writing and that Good Times card was just perfect. I also loved the brick wall card and used it for a snap of a new coffee place that opened in town. I used a few of the wood banners on this side, one under the printable that I altered and one with the perfectly sized alpha on top. Marcy's printables got a really great work out this month. That digital clock tag was the perfect way to showcase my wasted day on jury duty and her summer bucket list card came in handy too. I just cut it into a circle, applied it on top of one of her circle labels and did a print and cut on my Silhouette.

When I was trying to come up with an idea for my title card I kept coming back to this photo I took as we entered the drive in, I loved the vintage flair of the lighted signs so much and it really worked so well with that Good Times card. I started thinking about movie posters and the next thing you know this happened. I did a quick Google search on how to create a movie poster and there are several cool sites out there that do it for you. I of course wanted to make it my own so I dug a bit deeper and found a font that will make the credits for you, you can find it here. I LOVE how this turned out, like a lot. I want to frame it, its such an awesome reminder of a great week and the great friends we got to share it with. They are troopers for putting up with all my photo taking and for that they deserve major awards.

On to the insert I made for the week. This stamp in the Funnel Cake addon had me jumping for joy when I first saw the image and then absolutely giddy when I saw it in person in my box. It was the first thing I opened and its perfect. I really wanted to do something dramatic and had planned on placing this on a full 12x12 layout as an insert but my photos just wouldn't cooperate so it became this, and its better than what I had initially planned. I opened the digital stamp and just erased the rest of the states so that only the California remained. I opened it up in my Silhouette and traced it and cut it out. I placed it on top of a plastic sheet that I had and cut apart that there's no place like home card and placed it down.

Within Photoshop Elements I reversed the image of the stamp, filled it so it was solid black and then clipped my three photos from the evening to it using a clipping mask. I couldn't print the whole thing because I don't have a large scale printer but I just cropped the first photo and saved the two pieces separately as .png files. I opened them in my Silhouette and did a print and cut of them onto photo paper so they would be cut exactly perfect around the edges. I adhered them to the backside of the plastic sheet right on top on the reverse image of the map. I then created journaling blocks in a sort of similar font and cut them so that they would lay right on top of the cuts from the front. After I had it all laid out I decided to cut along the edge because the excess plastic was bugging me a little because it had nothing on it. I really hope you all try this with the state you live it because it really is amazing cut out super sized.

There are so many amazing cards in the two addons, I will be making layouts for days with these kits. The themes are amazing and so versatile. I picked out the ones that worked the best with my photos like that The Weird and Wonderful card, perfect for an amazing snap my husband took of this super cool giant red dragonfly that loves to hang out by our tomato plants. The little tag embellishments in the High Striker addon are always a favorite when they come in the kits. Its so fun to add little sentiments this way instead of always typing it on the photos. That photo card was perfect paired with my 'Instaversary' and I loved the little acrylic pieces in the main kit and they worked great on this spread.

This side is super photo heavy which is always good and I loved playing with the silver tags and the silver puffy stars that came in the Bottle Toss addon. I also used a ton of the printables Geralyn made this month, they just worked so well with my fair and BBQ photos. Plus can we talk about the amazing silver puffy stars and the silver edge tags in Bottle Toss, love them.

For my title card I really loved the stamps that Shanna made for the Bottle Toss addon and when I sat there looking at them an idea popped into my head to make a spinner card using the digital files to help guide my cut file design. After a little trial and error within Photoshop Elements and my Silhouette software I got the design just right and was able to print and cut my design perfectly.

Here is that video I shared in my sneak post the other day in case you haven't seen it in action.

If you are interested in making your own spinner card this month, you can download the .pdf version of the template here and the .studio version to cut with your Silhouette Cameo here. Pair it with the digital stamps and your own text to make something unique to you and your needs.

I want to also call out to you a few things to look out for when you are checking out the kits this month, in particular this 4th of July card set, I have them in hand and they are amazing. The veneer flag is so, so cool! I cannot wait to put them to use in a few weeks in my Project Life® spread for that week.

Monday, June 23, 2014

This past week has been a whirlwind of activity; lots of end of school year stuff, projects to make, guests to prep for, etc. Typical summer stuff and its great, being busy is good, being pressed for time is good. It sure helps my mojo when I have to make decisions quickly instead of linger over them.

Penny Arcade, what a great kit name right! It reminds me of the good ole days playing Skee ball at the Santa Cruz Boardwalk with my brother and my cousin collecting as many tickets as we could. Its that carefree, playfulness that I tried to capture in the two spreads I made with these kits.

Here is my first spread, all with the main kit only.

this printable, so perfectly timed.

so much digital work on this spread, this is pretty much all digital and so much fun to make.

these two cards were favorites for sure.

The stamp addon this month, Funnel Cake is AMAZING! I had to use it this month and super-sized it and cut it and made an insert out of it. There just might be something on the backside of it too...

My second spread, using the main and the two addons, High Striker and Bottle Toss.

Its funny how some stamps just speak to me and Shanna Noel knows how to design stamps that do just that for me. I loved the set in Bottle Toss and when I was looking at it an idea came to me, you can see it in action above and below.

I loved playing with the washi tape this month, I have missed using it so it was fun to use.

I love when these types of embellishments are in the kits, the perfect small accent.

Silver lovers rejoice! Its a silver explosion this month.

You can see more sneaks from the team here and on Instargram #scsneaks and its not too late to start your subscription to any of the kits to get in on the action for the big reveal for subscribers at 9:00am PST on June 27th, click here and hit Subscribe on any of the kits you are interested in.

I'll see you back here this Friday for a reveal of my full spreads, its also someones last day of school so it's a really big day!

Monday, June 16, 2014

Last year one of the funnest things we did was come up with a Summer Bucket List and we did a pretty good job of completing lots of the items too. When the weather started warming up again I knew we needed to start thinking of Bucket List items for this year too. Even though my daughter is still in school we consider any days between June 1st and August 31st as Summer so we can maximize our days and have lots of time to cover lots of items. This year I kept the same basic design as last year list but changed up the fonts and added some color. My daughter liked having a way to mark off the items so this year I used little hearts that she could fill in instead of the squares to check off. Here is this years list;

It doesn't look like I ever posted last years list here so here it is for reference.

If you've never made a bucket list I really suggest you do, it doesn't have to be as long or as involved and it really is for all ages. In fact I loved checking off the items just as much as my daughter did. It's also the perfect thing to have on hand for those 'I'm bored' moments which always seems to happen during the summer.

Oh and if you are looking for a list of all of the National Holidays that I have on my list you can see the full list of all of them here. It's written by month and there are a lot of good ones.

Wednesday, June 11, 2014

Yesterday this girl turned 6½ years old. Looking thru her photos while I was making this was so much fun, so many forgotten fun times and cute smiles. Long gone are the curls and that crooked head tilt when she smiled for photos. In its place is a confident and happy girl that makes me smile each and every day. We don't typically make a super big deal about her half birthday even though she would love an excuse for a party. Instead we try to do a little something fun to mark the day and this year we went to a pottery painting place for the first time. We had the best time and she did the best job painting her little box to hold her new collection of earrings. While we were out two of her friends and Mom came by with a half of a cupcake for her which was just the sweetest thing ever! I so wish we had been home to catch that moment on film. Suffice it to say she loved every minute of her special day down to the last bit of frosting on that half of a cupcake.

Monday, June 9, 2014

Every Sunday Studio Calico posts three sketches to inspire their members to scrap, make a card or work on their Project Life® spreads and yesterdays post was done by me. I had a lot of fun interpreting one of the sketches into a full size layout and you can see the blog post here.

As you can see in the blog post I ended up using only the Hello Hello Project Life® kits to complete my layout which is something some of the members over at Studio Calico have been asking to see. It was a fun challenge and I hope this helps give them a few ideas in that direction.

When I initially started the layout I thought my lines and embellishments would be radiating out from the main photo cluster but then I had the idea to change them up to circles instead and mimic the lines of a vinyl record so hopefully that makes some sense. I adore these little veneer sequins and loved how they looked colored in with the markers. I grabbed some colors from that amazing sheet of rainbow paper from the the 4x6 Paper Pad as my color inspiration.

I hope you play along with the sketch challenge because there's a chance to win a $5 Studio Calico gift card so make sure you get your projects posted in the Blog Comments by June 16th.